Iraqi Militants Seize Country's Largest Dam

This undated file image posted on a militant website on Tuesday, Jan. 14, 2014, which has been verified and is consistent with other AP reporting, shows fighters from the al-Qaida linked ISIL marching in Raqqa, Syria. MILITANT WEBSITE
>

BAGHDAD — Sunni militants from the Islamic State group on Thursday seized Iraq's largest dam, placing them in control of enormous power and water resources and access to the river that runs through the heart of Baghdad.

After a week of attempts, the radical Islamist gunmen successfully stormed the Mosul Dam and forced Kurdish forces to withdraw from the area, residents living near the dam told The Associated Press. They spoke anonymously for safety concerns.

The Islamic State group posted a statement online Thursday, confirming that they had taken control of the dam and vowed to continue "the march in all directions," adding that it will not "give up the great Caliphate project." The group added that it has seized a total of 17 cities, towns and targets — including the dam — over the past five days. The statement could not be verified but it was posted on a site frequently used by the group.

Halgurd Hekmat, a spokesman for the Peshmerga, told The Associated Press that clashes around the dam are ongoing and he does not know who is in control at this point in time.

The al-Qaida-breakaway group has established its idea of an Islamic state in the territory it controls in Iraq and Syria, imposing its harsh interpretation of Islamic law. Iraqi government forces, Kurds and allied Sunni tribal militiamen have been struggling to dislodge the Islamic State militants and its Sunni allies with little apparent success.

The Mosul Dam — or Saddam Dam as it was once known — is located north of Iraq's second-largest city Mosul, which fell to the militants on June 10. Fighting intensified in the region Sunday after the nearby towns of Zumar and Sinjar fell to the militants. It's not the only dam they are targeting.

Iraq's second largest dam, the Haditha Dam in the western Anbar province, has also been at risk of takeover but remains in the hands of the Iraqi military.

The Kurdish fighters, known as the peshmerga, had initially managed to stall the militant advances, but their defense has waned in recent weeks.

The seizing of dams and reservoirs gives the militants control over water and electricity that they could use to help build support in the territory they now rule by providing the scarce resources to residents. Or they could sell the resources as a lucrative source of revenue.

There are also fears the militants could release the waters of the dam and devastate the country all the way down to the capital Baghdad, though maintaining the dam's power and water supplies will be key to their attempts to build a state.

Late Wednesday, militants overran a cluster of predominantly Christian villages alongside the country's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, sending tens of thousands of civilians and Kurdish fighters fleeing from the area, several priests in northern Iraq said Thursday. The capture of Qaraqoush, Iraq's biggest Christian village, and at least four other nearby hamlets, brings the Islamic State to the very edge of the Iraqi Kurdish territory and its regional capital, Irbil.

On Monday, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ordered the Iraqi air force to provide aerial support to the Kurds, in a rare show of cooperation between Baghdad and the Kurdish regional government that underscored the serious nature of this crisis.

The French government on Thursday called for an emergency meeting by the United Nations Security Council to address the advances of the Islamic State militants and "the intolerable abuses committed," and asked that the international community mobilizes itself against the threat.

Even as Sunni militants have been taking control of territory in the north and west of the country, Baghdad has been increasingly targeted by car bombs, with a string of explosions killing at least 66 people in the last two days.

Iraqi officials said a suicide car bomber rammed his explosives-laden car into a police checkpoint Thursday, killing at least 15 people. A security official said nine civilians were among the dead in Thursday's attack that took place in the predominantly Shiite northern neighborhood of Kazimiyah. He added that 26 other people were wounded.

A medical official confirmed the causality figure. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to release information.